This article is a collaboration with Shopee Malaysia.
What was one of the things you never imagined people sell online in Malaysia? How about tattoo equipment? Yes tattoo equipment meaning things like needles, ink or sterilization solution.
Everything that you might need in order to paint a tattoo onto someone. The online store that sells it is called Moon Tattoo Supply started by a lady that goes by the name Moon.
Moon first got into the tattoo equipment business when she first started out in the working world. She worked for 5 years in a company that sells tattoo equipment and learned the ropes. At the age of 23, she became a mom to a baby girl.
With the added family responsibilities of being a single mom, Moon decided that she had to make more money. So after she left her job of 5 years she decided to venture out on her own as an entrepreneur.
She started her own tattoo equipment supply company that sold tattoo equipment online. Her initial online business traction prompted her to expand her business to also sell a personal passion of hers: Handcrafted jewelry like this piece.
Sales grew really well so she has now expanded her inventory to include other ready made jewelry that she thinks look great.
Today she has a small business that employs 3 full-time employees. She also makes 5 times of what she used to make as a salary person with her earnings and sales growing.
Moon testifies that one thing that is driving her sales for her handcrafted jewelry business is a new ecommerce platform that she just got on to recently called Shopee. Shopee isn’t the first ecommerce platform that had approached her to set up shop. Far from it really. Moon tried many different apps but they all struggled with different issues. Some didn’t have a payment gateway, some had a delivery system that left much to be desired or no chatting applications or even that the app would take a long time to upload a product. Shopee on the other hand handled all these things really well.
In the past in order to sell handmade jewelry she would have to take up a spot at a bazaar. Bazaars worked for her but there were issues.
The main issue being time. Moon would go to bazaars every day and spend the entire day there, leaving very little time to spend with her daughter. Today with Shopee she connects with her clients via the mobile phone and no longer needs to be at a bazaar to sell to them. Similarly her customers no longer have to get into a car just to buy her stuff. So she saves time and can focus on selling what matters to her.
It’s amazing how technology has built businesses like Moon’s and how they have evolved. How a business that used to be conducted physically moved to the web and now from the web to mobile. Today’s technology didn’t just help Moon achieve financial independence but it also gave her the time she needed as a single mother.
When I asked Moon about what she did so that she was able to make it, she said “Keep going no matter what, understand what your clients’ need and keep up with the trends”.
Today Moon is one of the many entrepreneurs on Shopee, a platform with over 200,000 users in Malaysia. Her store on Shopee lists 1,452 products for sale and has 85% positive reviews which sounds like she has really high customer satisfaction.
So if you want to start a business and sell something or just go shopping from your phone, check out Shopee on the App Store and Google Play.
With my collaboration with Shopee I’ve got a promo code you can use when you sign up.
Use TIMOTHYTIAH when you sign up and you’ll get an RM20 discount with a minimum spend of RM50. It’s only valid for the first 200 users, first time users and one time use only. Not valid for tickets, vouchers, mobile top-ups and bill payments. The code expires on the 10th of January 2016, 11.59PM.
Timothy Tiah – Co-Founder of Colony, Kuala Lumpur Co-Working Space